Cateye GameBike fails to get Gamespot's heart pumping

Exercise machines hooked to games... sounds like a stupid idea on its face. And thus far, execution of it HAS been stupid. Using a bike for a car racing game? Come on. You can do better than that.

To any company wanting to put together some sort of innovative exercise-involving game, I suggest you watch the first 4 or 5 episodes of an anime entitled JINKI Extend. Finding some fansubs shouldn't be that hard. In one episode, I forget which, the main character needs to train to improve her stamina. How does she do it? Well, she is lucky to have someone looking out for her who rigs up a type of battle simulator thing which also has a treadmill hooked to it. It's not the primary method of control, however! She plays the simulator, and runs on the treadmill to advance. It mixes up exercise and rest. A very good concept.

Throwing a bike in front of a racing game is stupid because that's not how people should exercise. Nobody advocates riding an exercise bike as fast as you possibly can for 4 hours straight. And having to stop playing the game after half an hour or so will make people not want to go back to it. Mix it up, however, with a game that perhaps even encourages you to realize how your stamina is improved, etc and you could have a really damn good game.

Anime aside, just look to the excellent arcade game "Prop Cycle," from 1996... A great game that used a pedal-control to guide an "E.T."-style flying BMX bike around to pop balloons to save a city that was floating away... Man, that game was fun. Never could have made it to the home consoles... Until now!

http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=P&game_id=9139

I just purchased a gamebike, and I dunno, I'm impressed. It's a lot of fun, and the only gripe I have is that games with more then just accelerate and brake are hard to control. But simple arcade racers are tons of fun.

Note to Rin- 4 months on and do you still think the bike has been good to keep exercising.

I am looking to bye a cateye in England - can anyone suggest a retailer, as the one authorised seller wont deal with a non trade enquiry...